Quote of the Day

[Content Note: Queer- and transphobia; Christian Supremacy; violence.]

"Voters in Houston showed values still matter, and they were clear in their opposition to Proposition 1. I applaud the community leaders and pastors in Houston for organizing a strong effort to defeat this measure."—Republican Texas Governor Greg Abbott, on the defeat of the Houston Equal Rights Ordinance.

Fuck you, Abbott. You don't have the market cornered on values, despite the Christian Supremacist rhetoric that permeates the US public square suggesting otherwise.

I have values, too. For example: I value the safety of queer and/or trans people.

Every damn election, we are obliged to listen to conservatives caterwauling about how they are Values Voters, using thinly coded language that implies that only their particular set of beliefs constitute "values."

Well, as it happens, I'm a values voter: I deeply value autonomy and consent. I deeply value bodily autonomy and consent. I deeply value equality and justice for marginalized people. I deeply value marriage equality. I deeply value stem cell research. I deeply value the separation of church and state. I deeply value science being taught in schools. I deeply value universal healthcare. I deeply value a robust social safety net.

I value lots of other things, too, all of which make me a person without values, as far as religious conservatives like Abbott are concerned.

Despite their reflexive and compulsive intoning of the word "values," as if it's a magical incantation that can be uttered only by those who understand its complex truth, it doesn't really mean anything, in and of itself. It's an ethically neutral word. Everyone has values. What matters is not that you have values, but what values you have. Joseph Stalin valued killing people. Jeffrey Dahmer valued eating people. George Bush valued torturing people. I value not killing people, not eating them, and not torturing them. See? Everyone has values.

And, you know, I have faith, too. Not religious faith, but that isn't the only kind. I have faith in my fellow humans—and I'm not so sure that particular brand of faith should be so easily disregarded, because, quite frankly, it's a hell of a lot harder than having faith in a god, at least in my experience. The god to whom I was introduced as a child was never deliberately evil or unkind; that god may have been mysterious, but he had a plan—and you knew that everything made sense according to his plan, even if it was inexplicable to you. And there was a reward for having faith in that god. Faith in him was your ticket to eternity in heaven. Faith in him, as far as the reasons he offered, was simple.

Humans, on the other hand, the troublesome shits, conspire not only to test but to betray your faith at every opportunity. Too often evil and unkind, they mostly can't even be bothered to provide a decent reason for their ill behavior. They're unpredictable, nonsensical, irrational, and unreasonable, and there's no promise of a reward for having faith in them. Sometimes, in fact, you get nothing but spit in your eye in exchange for your trust. For your faith.

The difference between faith in a god and faith in humankind is like the difference between dropping money in the canister of a Recognizable Charity bell-ringer and placing money directly in the hand of someone in need. Your Recognizable Charity donation goes to someone you don't know, whom you'll never see, and, although you're not sure how it all works, you trust that your money will help in a productive way. It's an easy trust—the Recognizable Charity's been there a long time, and they've got a good reputation, and they promise you something for your effort.

On the other hand, giving the money directly to someone in need requires having faith in the person to whom you're giving it, respecting hir ability to make the best decisions for hirself, letting go of any expectation for how that money will be spent. You may hope that zie won't, say, put it on a horse, despite being hungry, because the temptation of gambling is stronger than hir will to nourish hir body. You may hope that zie buys hirself a sandwich, or mittens, or a pint, but you must respect that your hope is a projection, and have faith in hir self-determination. It's a harder trust—and it's not tax deductible, either.

The two aren't mutually exclusive, of course. There are plenty of people who have faith in a god(s) and faith in humankind. But there are a lot of people who only have faith in a god, because their religion tells them humans aren't worth having faith in.

Those tend to be the people who want to legislate morality, because they don't trust people to make good decisions, because they don't even trust themselves. And those are the people who are most often called the "values voters" and to whose religious beliefs the word "faith" has come to refer.

It's a terrible thing that the people who have the least faith in their fellow humans have commandeered the term, because, on this earth, humans are the only ones who can feed the hungry, clothe the poor, provide healthcare to the sick, guarantee equality and freedom.

Those of us who have faith in each other value decidedly earthy humanness, with all its flaws and foibles. That doesn't sound particularly inspiring; there are no hymns, no psalms, no Hallelujah chorus for having faith in other people.

But maybe there should be.

Because there are the times when they surprise you, when your faith pays off, makes you grin until you are certain your face will crack, or your eyes well with tears, at the wonder of how much overwhelming goodness can be found in we hairless apes. It provides a reward the beautiful magnitude of which is only bestowed because of the risk that things could have—maybe should have—gone so horribly wrong.

It's not typical that your faith in people is remunerated by your expectations being exceeded, when they amaze you with the depth of their decency, and its rarity makes such optimism, such faith, difficult. And makes it a faith worth courting, too, even if our values seem a bit grotty and earthbound.

Anyway.

Abbott and his pals really need to can it with the faith-based values rhetoric, as if there is singular agreement on values among people of religious faith; as if there is a singular type of faith one can have.

Especially because what he's talking about may be values in the literal sense of what people prize and prioritize, but not in the colloquial parlance in which "values" is (mis)construed to mean a superior decency. Resistance to providing safety to vulnerable people is wholly indecent, especially under the upside-down auspices of protecting privileged people from the marginalized people seeking protections they actually need.

What Abbott is talking about isn't values; it's bigotry cloaked in a veil of "values."

And I value calling that right the fuck out. I see you, Abbott. You contemptible nightmare.